When the Last Leaf Falls
by Diana Lucifera
Summary: [ONESHOT] Professor Trelawney has predicted that, when the last leaf falls from the Whomping Willow, Parvati Patil will find her soulmate. All she has to do is wait. Of course, it would be so much easier if a very bored Draco Malfoy would just GO AWAY!


Disclaimer: Yes, yes. Not mine, no profit, blah blah blah. Don't sue me.

Well, here you go! It's a Draco/Parvati, written in response to a challenge not, in any way, shape, or form, directed at me. It's not the best thing I've ever written, but give me a break. I'm stretching my legs with this ship. Oh, and don't worry; I'm still a Draco/Ginny shipper to the very core of my being.

Though, I've found myself falling in love with this pairing. It's so underappreciated! Would you believe they don't even have a fanlisting? Harry/Hedwig has a fanlisting for gods sakes!

Anyway, I'll be spitting out Draco/Parvati, Draco/Pansy, and Ron/Pansy one- shots periodically, from now on. Just so you know. Read on and Review!

* * *

Draco Malfoy stumbled through the waist-high grass, glowering over his shoulder as Crabbe and Goyle ambled of in the opposite direction. 

"Stupid Hogsmead," he muttered under his breath. "Stupid Crabbe. Stupid Goyle. Stupid Potter."

What was he going to do now? Banned from Hogsmeade, how humiliating. Potter, of course, had gotten away without any punishment, like he always did. He kicked a nearby rock, starting a small landslide.

The cloud of dust and pebbles rolled on down the hill and, to Draco's surprise, rained down on someone's unsuspecting head.

"Hey! What-" Parvati Patil jumped to her feet, trying to brush the dirt out of her brown hair. "Oh. _Malfoy_."

Draco glared at her.

"Must you say my name as if it were a curse word?" he asked, attempting to sound innocent.

"It practically is. We Gryffindors are thinking of having it added into the dictionary, you know."

"Oh, yes," Draco sneered at her. "You're such a good, little Gryffindor, Patil. Though, it's funny. I'd think you would be on my side."

"Do you now? And why is that, I wonder? Do I look like a hateful bigot, suddenly?"

Malfoy smirked.

"Well, the Patils are, after all, an old pure-blood family, no?"

She didn't answer.

"And it was my impression that your relatives, on the whole, rather agree with me. To have one of their own become a muggle-loving Gryffindor, how _disappointing_ that must have been. But then, I hear you were always a disappointment. Imagine wanting a boy to be your heir and getting _two_ girls!"

"Shut up, Malfoy," Parvati snapped and, behind her, the Whomping Willow munched viciously on a bird.

Malfoy did a double take. "Bloody-!"

"Oh, don't worry. We're out of its reach," Parvati said dismissively, still glaring.

"Well, I should hope so. Why on earth are you out here, you suicidal wench?"

"I'm waiting for my true love," she said, quite honestly, and plopped down on the rock were she had been sitting earlier, intent on ignoring him.

"Please tell me you're not serious."

"I'm perfectly serious, Malfoy. Madame Trelawney predicted..." Draco laughed out loud, and Parvati's voice rose, trying to speak over him. "Madame Trelawney predicted that I would meet my soulmate today!"

He snorted. "You actually believe that crackpot?"

Parvati's chin rose defiantly.

"Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. She said that, when the last leaf fell from the Whomping Willow, my soulmate would be made known to me."

"But Patil," Malfoy chuckled. "Don't all of the leaves fall at once?"

She froze.

"Well... Yes."

"Huh. Well, then, how is that going to work?"

"I guess," Parvati looked lost. "I guess, when they all fall..."

"Then why didn't she say that?" he sat on the rock next to her, and she scooted quickly away from him. "Believe me, that woman knows nothing. On the first day of class, she told me I'd be dead by March."

"The Eye can be misinterpreted," she intoned solemnly. "One is not always sure..."

"She was so sure that she bought me a copy of a book called Preparing For the End and sent out for a will!"

"Just... Shut up, Malfoy."

And to her surprise, he did just that. He leaned back on his hands, turned his face to the sky, and began to whistle. Parvati stared at him for a moment.

"Uh, Malfoy? Are you planning to leave anytime soon?"

"No. I want to stick around and meet your true love. Bet it's Potter," he said with relish.

"You can't!" Parvati shrieked. "Absolutely not! Go! Now!"

"No."

"Yes!"

"No!"

"Uhh! Fine! Stay if you like!"

Smirking triumphantly, Malfoy reached into his discarded bag, pulling out a Sugar Quill to suck on. They were silent for a moment, save the titter of birds. Finally, Parvati spoke.

"You're really going to stay, then? Don't you, like, have anything better to do?"

"Nope," said Malfoy, pulling a Licorice Wand out of the candy bag. "Torturing you is the best entertainment the universe has provided me in weeks. Besides, your pal Potter got me banned from Hogsmeade."

Her dark cheeks reddened slightly.

"That wasn't Harry's fault! You insulted his mother!"

"He insulted mine."

"You tripped Ron!"

"He's a git."

"So? Didn't mean you had to trip him."

They were silent again. Malfoy nibbled on a Chocolate Frog.

"So... When is this soulmate of yours showing up?"

Parvati narrowed her eyes at him. "Like I said before, sometime today. The leaves are supposed to fall today."

"Ah," he licked chocolate off of his fingers. "So, where's Panda?"

"Padma. My sister's name is Padma. And she's in Hogsmeade, of course."

"What about Brown?"

"Also Hogsmeade. They wanted to stay, but I told them to go ahead. I had wanted to meet my true love _alone_."

She stressed the word "alone", holding it out rather longer than necessary. He didn't seem to notice.

"Are Crabbe and Goyle in Hogsmeade?"

He bit violently into the Peppermint Humbug he was now nibbling on.

"Yeah."

"It was nice of you to let them go."

Malfoy looked disbelieving.

"Let them go? I wanted them to stay, of course! I didn't let them go. They just... went."

He crossed his arms over his chest, pouting like a toddler.

"Oh. But, don't they-"

"Do whatever I say? I wish," he scoffed bitterly.

Another awkward silence settled over them. Parvati wished he would leave, so that she wouldn't have to keep making non-conversation with him. It didn't look likely, though. Malfoy was now popping pieces of Drooble's Best Blowing Gum into his mouth, snickering and looking as if he wanted nothing more than to clap his hands together in glee when the Whomping Willow began to attack the unfortunate bubbles.

Parvati had to laugh at the display. Trying to conceal her mirth, she looked quickly away and then back to Malfoy. He was now picking up large rocks and throwing them at the tree.

"You're really immature, you know that?"

He stuck out his tongue, which was stained a bright shade of blue. "You're really _dull_, you know _that_?"

"How much candy do you have in there anyway?" He really was going through it at an alarming rate.

"Loads," he said and blew another bubble.

She paused for a moment, waiting to see if he would offer her any. He didn't.

"Look, Malfoy, I know you don't like me. I'm not particularly fond of you, either. But, please, please, please, would you leave? I- I really don't know if he'll come if you're here."

He pondered this for a moment then, to her exasperation, replied with a question.

"You do know that you and Panda are considered to be probably the best-looking girls in our year, don't you? Oh, don't shake your head. Even the Slytherins think so. So, tell me this, Patil. Why does someone as good-looking as you are have to wait for their soulmate to show up? Why don't you already _have_ a boyfriend?"

"I don't know." Parvati felt her cheeks heat up. "I- I'm just not interested in anyone."

"So you don't have your hopes up? Not hoping for Finnegan or Weasley, or somebody?"

"No."

"Mmm..." Malfoy leaned back again. "Then this will be terribly interesting."

"I take it you're not leaving then."

"Oh, did you want me to?"

"Uhhh!"

She didn't say anything else for a moment and then, as if it had only just registered, turned to face him slightly.

"Do you think I'm the prettiest?"

He blinked. "What?"

"You said even the Slytherins thought so. Do you?"

"Well, I don't know. I suppose-" He brow wrinkled, as if in serious concentration. "Yes. Yes, I rather think you are."

"Really?"

"Yeah. You know, I really think you're prettier than Panda."

"It's Padma. And how's _that_? We're identical!"

"Yes, but when I insult her, she just starts crying. Never stands up for her friends, either. Just keeps reading."

"So, I'm prettiest because I've yelled at you?"

"Mmhmm. Yes, definitely."

Parvati found herself not at all enamored with his reasoning.

"What is that, some bizarre turn-on of yours?"

"Yup. Fancied Ginny Weasley forever, because she stomped on my foot."

Parvati wasn't sure whether Malfoy was joking or not, but she rather hoped he was. She couldn't help noticing that, for some reason, he seemed to be getting friendlier. He might have just felt comfortable, but Parvati suspected that it had something to do with the large amounts of concentrated sugar he was eating.

"I'll tell you what, though," He tossed an empty wrapper at the Willow, watching it get ripped to shreds. "If someone like you has to find their soulmate by prophesy, then there sure as hell isn't any hope for the rest of us."

"I'm not- Malfoy, maybe you _shouldn't_ drink that butterbeer- I'm not all that special. And, anyway, it's not like it matters how pretty I am."

He shrugged, draining the butterbeer anyway. "To who? Your parents?"

She started. They had been whom she'd been thinking of. How odd that he should know it.

"Well, you can't ever really please them, can you? No matter what you do, they still won't care. You can spend your whole life doing what they want you to, and it still not be good enough, or you can do what you want and be satisfied. If you want to care about looks, then care about looks! If not, don't! If you want to be team captain, be team captain! If you don't want to, don't!"

Parvati stared at him for a moment.

"I think you were right. Maybe I shouldn't have had that butterbeer," he said, looking into the empty butterbeer bottle. "The point is: parents are idiots."

"_What?_" Parvati was confused and not a little surprised by his frankness.

"Err..." Malfoy looked suddenly abashed. "I'm, uh, fighting with my father right now, if you couldn't tell."

"I could, actually."

They were silent for a moment. Malfoy was glaring at his bag of sweets as if it was responsible for his slip-up (Parvati wasn't quite sure it wasn't, after all.) and seemed to be taking great care not to look at her. Deciding that she was going to have to break the silence, Parvati sat up straighter, tucking her dark legs underneath her.

"So, what happened?"

"Huh?" He turned to look at her, slightly cross-eyed. Maybe some of those sweets had been alchoholic.

That would explain a lot, actually.

"With your father?" Parvati prompted.

"Oh," he looked away again. "Just a load of nonsense. He's angry, because I keep losing to Potter. Doesn't think I _deserve_ to be team captain."

"That's horrible!"

"Not that horrible. I'm really not that good of a seeker, if you haven't noticed."

"I think you're wonderful," she said resolutely. "It's only Harry you lose to and- and if you've worked hard enough to make captain, then you do deserve the position!"

Malfoy's cheeks pinkened a little.

"I know that. I'll do it, of course. It's just... Well, you know."

She did know. It was horrible having someone you loved so unhappy with you. Worse still, she supposed, for the children of deatheaters, the sons and daughters who loved someone who could never truly love them back, knowing that nothing could change that, no matter how hard they tried to please them.

Parvati's parents had never been deatheaters, no matter how much they hated muggle-borns and no matter how hard they were to please. She couldn't imagine living with that invisible standard floating just above her head, forever. Couldn't imagine knowing that she wasn't loved, wasn't cared for. Then again, watching Draco Malfoy, she supposed she could after all.

"Yeah, well," he seemed to be searching for something to say. "Well, goodbye then."

"What? You're leaving?"

"Yup," Malfoy stood, swipping a pale wrist across his mouth and missing most of the sugar collected there entirely.

"You-" Parvati stood, too. "You're leaving, just like that?"

"Yup." He slung his bag over his shoulder.

He turned on his heels to go, then paused. Twirling back around, he wrapped his hands around her wrists and pulled her abruptly into a sticky, sugary kiss. She froze, shocked, for a moment, and just as she'd made up her mind to kiss him back, he pulled away. If Parvati had blinked, she might have missed it.

"Well, good luck with that whole true love thing," said Malfoy, as if nothing at all unusual had just happened and sauntered off.

She sunk back onto the rock. If the taste of butterbeer wasn't still lingering in her mouth, she might have thought she'd only imagined the kiss. Touching her fingertips lightly to her lips, she turned, staring at the distant shape of Draco Malofy, as he made his way up the hill, back to Hogwarts.

Parvati turned back to the tree, furrowed her pretty brow, and came to a quick conclusion.

"I don't want to know who my soulmate is," she said to no one in particular. "I just don't want to know."

Malfoy had asked if she had anyone in mind that she wanted to be her true love. She didn't, truthfully. But there was something there. Something she definitely wouldn't be able to explore if she had a soulmate trailing after her. Trying with Malfoy, instead of with whoever it was that the fates had picked out for her, seemed a terribly stupid thing, but Parvati couldn't help thinking that it was the brave thing to do, as well.

And really, wasn't she supposed to be the courageous one, anyway?

Collecting her bags, Parvati shot one last, defiant look at the Whomping Willow, and dashed up the side of the hill, eyes fixed on the distant, bobbing gleam of Malfoy's blond hair. Perhaps Professor Trelawney had been wrong this time. Perhaps the last leaf meant nothing at all, Parvati thought. In fact, she was sure of it.

It is to Parvati's credit, however, that she would never know that the Whomping Willow shed its leaves as she made her way up the steps of Hogwarts. Save but one, which, she would never discover, drifted from the tree at the exact moment she caught up with Malfoy in the Entrance Hall. And, miles away, as Professor Trelawney brushed leaves out of her shawl, she smiled to herself.

Of course, this could have just been a coincidence.


End file.
